Developer: ARTillery
Publisher: Blowfish Studios, Gamera Game
Platform: Switch, PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S
Tested on: Switch
Catie in Meowmeowland – Review
ARTillery’s point-and-click adventure title Catie in Meowmeowland was supposed to arrive on the Switch on the 30th of March, the same date as the game’s launch on other platforms. Right before the game was supposed to go live though, it disappeared from the eShop. The official Twitter page for the game gave no reason for this, only that Catie in Meowmeowland would make its debut on Nintendo’s console at a later date. That later date is here now, and we’re finally able to take an in-depth look at the adorable point-and-click game. Was it worth the wait?
Story
If you’re familiar with Alice in Wonderland, then you might get a sense of déjà-vu here, as the idea behind Catie in Meowmeowland is essentially “Lewis Caroll’s classic except with cats”. The opening scene sees Catie go down the rabbit hole (cat hole?) after chasing a white cat with a pocket watch. She ends up in the titular Meowmeowland, where she’ll meet a plethora of quirky characters as she tries to find her way home. Of note here is that the story is told without dialogue or on-screen text. The characters talk in gibberish, although occasionally you’ll recognize a word here or there, such as “tik tok” to refer to the white cat’s watch. Catie in Meowmeowland clearly relies on both familiarity with the source material and the exaggerated emotional reactions of its cast to convey what is going on.
We’re not quite sure who the story’s target audience is though. The way the characters communicate with each other feels like it belongs in a morning tv show for toddlers, but the game’s jokes are often aimed at an older audience, with our favorite joke being that a character that is a literal rock looks suspiciously like a certain actor. On the other hand, some of the humor is decidedly low-brow, including an early game joke that sees our protagonist literally crawl out of a cat’s butthole. We’ve included screenshots of both of these instances for your convenience, so that you can judge for yourself whether or not Catie in Meowmeowland’s brand of humor is up your alley.
Graphics
The cutesy art style that brings Meowmeowland and its inhabitants to life has a storybook-like feel to it, and it’s probably one of the main reasons why people would look into Catie in Meowmeowland. It seems like different illustrators worked on the game, each bringing their own aesthetic to the game. While a clash of styles like what we’re getting here is often not visually pleasing, here it works as it emphasizes the surreal and dream-like atmosphere of Meowmeowland itself. If anything, we did feel like the design for Catie herself felt a bit too simple, not just compared to some of the outlandish NPCs that she encounters, but also because her character model lacks the detail and shading seen elsewhere in the game.
Sound
As we mentioned before, the voice acting is limited to gibberish with the occasional recognizable word thrown in. This works well enough to convey character emotions, and to our surprise, it didn’t grow tiresome throughout our time with the game. That is more of a case of Catie in Meowmeowland only being four hours or so, and we can imagine that the “baby-speak” will get on many people’s nerves earlier than that. One thing that irked us when it came to the game’s voice audio was that there was a slight echo on Catie herself. The game also features a laid-back and atmospheric soundtrack, which fits perfectly with the low-stakes nature of Catie’s adventure.
Gameplay
What you’re getting here in terms of gameplay is a short but sweet point-and-click adventure title that puts a heavy emphasis on puzzles. There are 24 puzzles present here, which isn’t a whole lot, and playing through Catie in Meowmeowland shouldn’t take you more than a lazy afternoon. Unlike more elaborate point-and-click games, such as the Dark Eye series, puzzles are typically standalone affairs here, feeling more like individual levels, instead of being presented as being part of a bigger thing. We’re not quite sure how intentional this is, as having the puzzles not directly connected to the narrative does add to the dream-like overall atmosphere of the game, but it also makes the effort you put into them seem inconsequential.
Rather than an interconnected world, which is par for the course in point-and-click titles, Meowmeowland’s puzzles are presented as semi-standalone affairs that tell a mini-story, comprising a single screen most of the time. However, some of the more elaborate puzzles are multi-screen affairs. The mini-stories surrounding the puzzles range from helping a snail with his dream to become speedy, to feeding an elephant-like creature so that he gets out of the way, allowing Catie to cross a bridge into the next part of the game. While the situations themselves can be absurd, there is an internal logic to this world, and likewise, the puzzles.
Figuring out exactly what you need to do is part of the challenge. As we mentioned in the story section of this review, there is no in-game text. Explanations of what you’re expected to do are delivered through animated speech bubbles, which means that the solution to a puzzle isn’t always as clear as it should be. While the game never reaches The Long Gate’s levels of obtuseness, we did feel like actually explaining things would have made our experience a lot more enjoyable. A lot of the time, we had to brute force our way through certain puzzles through trial and error, and it took us way too long before we realized that we could use items on Catie herself instead of just the environment and the NPCs.
What doesn’t help here is the control scheme. Despite the aforementioned release delay on Switch, we felt like the game wasn’t exactly optimized for consoles. You need to use an on-screen mouse cursor to select on-screen objects. While it’s possible to adjust the mouse sensitivity in the game’s settings, we couldn’t find a speed that didn’t feel awkward. Your mileage may vary on other platforms that the game is available on, but we wouldn’t be surprised if the other console versions of Catie in Meowmeowland felt equally awkward to control, and we’d recommend going for the PC version of the game instead, just to be safe. That’s not to say that we’d outright tell you to steer clear from playing Catie in Meowmeowland on the Switch, as, despite the awkward controls, we still had a lot of fun with the game. The controls may take some getting used to, but the nature of the puzzles makes sure that the awkward movement of the mouse doesn’t break the game. We’re quite sure that the PC version is the superior way to play, but there is something that can be said about the Switch’s portability factor in this case.
Conclusion
While we enjoyed our time with Catie in Meowmeowland, this is a game that definitely isn’t for everyone as it is all over the place. The awkward control scheme and mixed humor don’t help here, but the relaxed atmosphere and low-stakes puzzle gameplay made up for the shortcomings. With its relatively short length, Catie in Meowmeowland also doesn’t overstay its welcome. The €11.99/$14.99 price point may feel a little steep for the amount of content that you’re getting here, so perhaps wait for a sale before picking this one up.
No Comments